In-laws & Out-laws

It's crazy for to think that it's already December. I really like December because we've got my birthday at the beginning of the month and then Christmas at the end, but it feels like it was just yesterday that it was January. I went back and read my blog posts from last December, and man oh man was I a mess! It didn't help that I was in the middle of some bad RE drama. Plus dealing with the in-laws.
Speaking of in-laws, Mum and Dad just left. They were here for 10 days this visit. We had some fun, some laughs, some aggravation and annoyances. Normal for any visit with them. myParents showed up on Thursday which helped keep some tempers (not me this time!) in check. A couple of things which I might (or might not) write about later:

• Mum told Kevin and I that while she was happy that we are pregnant that she's not going to allow herself to get excited about the baby until the baby is actually born. That she's not interested in any details or u/s pictures because if anything goes wrong, it will be that much harder to deal with.
• Mum called the dogs "daft dogs" a few times. Finally I said something to her about my dogs not being stupid so I'd appreciate it if she didn't call them that. She then tried to convince me that "daft" was a term of endearment. I maintained that it was not. She tried to show me different examples of how it was, but quickly realized that usually the term connotated my meaning more that hers. She didn't call them daft dogs for the remainder of her visit.
• Dad smoked. A LOT. Always outside, but then he would dump his ashes/cigar butt in the trashcan so the whole mudroom (house) would STINK!
• Kevin lost his temper a few times with his parents pretty early on. I think he was hurt by Mum's pronouncement and was lashing out.
• Kevin let his parents drive his car around the neighborhood. Apparently Mum kept flooding the engine (his car is a manual) and Dad almost crashed into cars parked on the other side of the road because he kept trying to drive on the wrong side of the road.
• I got upset with Kevin because he kept excluding Dad from things. He would think of things to do with Mum in mind and then instead of asking Dad if he wanted to do these things, he would ask "you don't want to do this, right?" That's not really inviting, is it?
• When it came round to doing Thanksgiving dinner, I was still smarting from last year's "snub" so I wasn't going to ask Mum for any help. Kevin asked me to include her so I relented and asked her to help me prepare this dish. Not only did she do it wrong but she asked a bazillion questions! Dude, you're cutting up vegetables, how hard is that? After that I recruited myMom to help with the rest of the dinner prep.
• myMom wanted to do a round of "What I'm thankful for" after myDad said the prayer. I vetoed the idea because I knew she'd go on and on about the baby and with Mum sitting across from her, I didn't want to start dinner with tension or awkwardness. Wiki thinks I might have hurt myMom's feelings so I guess I'll have to apologize for that.

Okay this post is long enough. I guess I should post more often, huh?